So you want to be paid like a Southwest pilot but you don't want to be efficient like a Southwest pilot.
Featherbedding has it's price.
If giving to a company made it strong and its pilots highly paid then US Airways would be the strongest airline with the most highly paid pilots. Nobody has given as much as we have.
Back in the early nineties Wolf complained that the average compensation per US Air employee was 20% higher than that of our composite competitor (gross compensation divided by number of employees). What he didn't mention was that the average revenue per US Air employee was double that of our nearest competitor, American (gross revenue divided by number of employees). 20% more compensation, 100% more revenue yet we were still at a disadvantage!
The vast majority of cost variables lie in the operation of the airline, ie; route structure, average stage length, average equipment gage, crew and aircraft utilization (ie no sitting around on duty), asset/financing management, etc.
Southwest pilots make what they do because the company is well managed on a corporate level. For example they don't fly their airplanes 12 hours a day compared to our 8 hours per day because of pilot efficiencies, they do it through marketing efficiencies.
Ever ask a Southwest pilot how many days it takes to make a full month? That's because they get used when they are at work. They don't sit like we do, like our crappy rigs facilitate.
Their planes don't sit around and their pilots don't sit around.
The only way we will ever see wages like they have at Southwest is if we stop enabling corporate malfeasance.
As long as it is accepted that the employees here are the problem this airline will continue to languish in sub mediocrity.
Rant over.
